Mooring up in Hvar – worth a try

We were up fairly promptly and away from our anchorage after a very peaceful night in the bay. Harry claimed he was kept awake by water slapping the boat. Our French neighbours were

away sharpish so we copied them and skipped breakfast. Our strategy, having not heard back from the dreadful ACI marina at Palmižana (I mean £91 a night, no one to answer the phones, no VHF), was to try Hvar itself on the off chance there was space. Jim had told us it was for the very rich and that we’d end up next to Beyoncé on someone – worth a try.

Hvar harbour was absolutely packed with all manor or craft – plenty of other yachts looking, numerous tourist boats, super yachts and the harbour master who told we no chance of morning by the town quay. It wasn’t quite as busy as the Round the Island start but not far off. He pointed out the red buoys and off we went hunting.
We could find a free one but did notice someone dropping anchor and backing in between two other yachts were were tied up. So once again we learnt through observation and without assistance from the near useless pilot book.

I signalled to one yacht that we were coming in and they stood by. He was Italian and had beautiful bikini clad daughters and guess what – I didn’t crash. Harry took the shorelines over and eventually clambered on to the quay and secured them to mooring rings. We were about 15 meters from shore so much hilarity pulling ourselves over on the dingy and climbing out in dinner attire.